“WANDERING JEW”

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 114, 7 February 1935, Page 8

“WANDERING JEW”

Preacher’s Rare Mission in Australian Backblocks \ MANY CLOSE CALL’S Dominion Special Service. Auckland, February 6. Born 64 years ago in the East End of London, the son of Jewish Poles, Air. Philip Lewis, who arrived in Auckland by the Aorangi, has spent the past 39 . years preaching wherever lie can find an audience in the backblocks of Australia.

A remarkable little man, his body bowed with age, but with the broad forehead and the clear eyes of a thinker, he is known throughout Australia as “The AVandering Jew.” He estimates that he has travelled over 261,000 miles, 73,000 of which he has walked, in the course of his self-im-posed life task. He makes his boots last longer even than the traditional Scotsman, and he is now wearing his ninety-first pair in 39 years. He generally manages to get a “mileage” of about 800 miles to the pair of boots. He makes no charge for his sermons and relies on the generosity of sympathisers for his livelihood. It is rarely that his faitli has been misplaced. Outlandish Spots. His travels in Australia have taken him to some of the most outlandish spots in the Commonwealth. “I have received kindness from all who have known my mission,” he declared. “I have had many close calls, but always I just managed to come out with my life,” continued Air. Lewis. “On two occasions when I have been fording rivers in Queensland, crocodiles have almost got me. Bulls in paddocks oydr which I have taken short cuts often chase me., Once in an outback camp I woke to find a five-foot snake in my bed. Cyclones and storms have buffeted me, and often I become soaked to the skin, but I have only been ill three times in my life. But it is all worth while —it is my life and I will walk and preach till I die.” • .